Ezekiel 10

¹ Then I looked, and above the dome that was over the heads of the cherubim there appeared above them something like a sapphire, in form resembling a throne. ² He said to the man clothed in linen, “Go within the wheelwork underneath the cherubim; fill your hands with burning coals from among the cherubim, and scatter them over the city.” He went in as I looked on. ³ Now the cherubim were standing on the south side of the house when the man went in; and a cloud filled the inner court. ⁴ Then the glory of the LORD rose up from the cherub to the threshold of the house; the house was filled with the cloud, and the court was full of the brightness of the glory of the LORD. ⁵ The sound of the wings of the cherubim was heard as far as the outer court, like the voice of God Almighty when he speaks.

⁶ When he commanded the man clothed in linen, “Take fire from within the wheelwork, from among the cherubim,” he went in and stood beside a wheel. ⁷ And a cherub stretched out his hand from among the cherubim to the fire that was among the cherubim, took some of it and put it into the hands of the man clothed in linen, who took it and went out. ⁸ The cherubim appeared to have the form of a human hand under their wings.

⁹ I looked, and there were four wheels beside the cherubim, one beside each cherub; and the appearance of the wheels was like gleaming beryl. ¹⁰ And as for their appearance, the four looked alike, something like a wheel within a wheel. ¹¹ When they moved, they moved in any of the four directions without veering as they moved; but in whatever direction the front wheel faced, the others followed without veering as they moved. ¹² Their entire body, their rims, their spokes, their wings, and the wheels — the wheels of the four of them — were full of eyes all around. ¹³ As for the wheels, they were called in my hearing “the wheelwork.” ¹⁴ Each one had four faces: the first face was that of the cherub, the second face was that of a human being, the third that of a lion, and the fourth that of an eagle.

¹⁵ The cherubim rose up. These were the living creatures that I saw by the river Chebar. ¹⁶ When the cherubim moved, the wheels moved beside them; and when the cherubim lifted up their wings to rise up from the earth, the wheels at their side did not veer. ¹⁷ When they stopped, the others stopped, and when they rose up, the others rose up with them; for the spirit of the living creatures was in them.

¹⁸ Then the glory of the LORD went out from the threshold of the house and stopped above the cherubim. ¹⁹ The cherubim lifted up their wings and rose up from the earth in my sight as they went out with the wheels beside them. They stopped at the entrance of the east gate of the house of the LORD; and the glory of the God of Israel was above them.

²⁰ These were the living creatures that I saw underneath the God of Israel by the river Chebar; and I knew that they were cherubim. ²¹ Each had four faces, each four wings, and underneath their wings something like human hands. ²² As for what their faces were like, they were the same faces whose appearance I had seen by the river Chebar. Each one moved straight ahead.

The four living creatures and wheels that made up the divine chariot with the divine presence of God above it that appeared in Ezekiel’s initial vision now reappear in this scene before the temple. The passage of time and the presence of the temple have now given Ezekiel a clearer understanding of the vision he sees. As Daniel Block states:

Most of the grammatical difficulties plaguing ch. 1 have been smoothed out; the abstract has become concrete; much of the analogical language has been eliminated; the sheer brilliance of the first vision has been toned down; and details that seemed out of place in ch. 1 now play a vital roles. Whereas Ezekiel’s first encounter with the heavenly throne-chariot had left the prophet struggling to describe what he saw, when the vehicle reappears more than a year later, he is able to deal with the encounter more rationally, and his description is more calculated. (Block, 1997, pp. 316-317)

The difficult to describe living creatures now realized to be cherubim and the wheels within wheels are now the wheelwork. The presence of the temple likely helped Ezekiel make the connections between the living creatures and the cherubim. The cherubim were crafted on the lid of the ark of the covenant and inside the holy of holies in the tabernacle (Exodus 25-26, 1 Kings 6) and while the statues of the cherubim and their presence on embroidery are stated they are not described beyond the wings of the cherubim touching. There is tradition of both the LORD meeting the people between the cherubim (referring to the ark of the covenant Exodus 25:22) the LORD above the cherubim (2 Kings 19:15) and the LORD who rides on the cherubim (2 Samuel 2: 2-15, Psalm 18: 1-15, Psalm 104:3). The visual imagery of the temple and song now are combined in this living throne-chariot where the presence of the LORD is above the cherubim and the wheelwork, and yet this is not a static throne but a wheeled one that the LORD rides upon.

The man clothed in linen is commanded to go into the wheelwork and take fire from it. In Isaiah 6: 6 a burning coal was taken from the altar to purify the prophet Isaiah, and although there are priestly echoes in this passage the implication here is that the coals are to burn the city. The word for scatter (Hebrew zaraq) is used in Leviticus 3 for the act of dashing blood on the altar for offerings of well-being. Yet, the action here is similar to the seventh seal in Revelation 8:1-5 where the fire from the altar is thrown upon the earth. The man who sealed those who moaned and groaned over the state of Israel, now becomes an agent of destruction. This man receives the burning coals from the cherubim depart to fulfill his instructions.

As I mentioned after discussing the living creatures/cherubim, wheelwork, and the heavenly throne-chariot in chapter 1, it is easy to become drawn to the images and miss the message. The imagery of the divine presence and the throne chariot indicate the movement of the LORD of Israel away from the temple. The actions of the executioners in the previous chapter and the man in linen with fire from the wheelwork in this chapter are communicating the judgment of the LORD upon the city of Jerusalem. The movement of the God of Israel has been deliberate throughout the past two chapters, only moving as far as the entrance of the east gate of the temple, but the overall direction is clear. God is leaving the building and in the next chapter the presence of God will leave the city.